“No,” she whisper-shouted, doing her best to hold a straight face. “Isn’t that a crime against Christmas?”
“It’s true. I’ve been sworn to secrecy. Only family knows the depths of our seasonal transgressions.”
“Your family sounds like the Santa mafia.”
I winked. “Don’t ask my grandmother where the bodies are buried. She’ll hand you a tumbler of cocoa and a shovel.”
Valerie laughed, the sound like an instant jolt to my chest. I could see her there, holding her ground against every frosty Delaney smile with one of her own high-wattage sunbeams until they all thawed or surrendered. Then I’d trade the shovel for an axe and cut us a real tree, starting a new tradition. One of our own.
The light above our heads flickered, and I looked at the ghost, staring me down like he knew exactly what I was thinking. He either wanted to toss me in the frozen lake or give me a fist-bump. His expression didn’t give much away, but the twitch at his mouth made me think it was the latter.
Valerie stood, stretching onto her toes to reach a box overhead. Her fingers brushed the edge. The thing tilted, and I was up, a cold sweat breaking across my skin.
“Letme get that one.”
“You’re very helpful for a fake husband.”
“Accidental,” I corrected, sliding in behind her. “There’s a difference.”
She went still, the back of her sweater brushing my chest, the closeness wrecking what was left of my resolve.
“Oh, yeah?” she said, her voice thin. “What’s the difference then?”
“Fake implies none of it’s real.”
Her head dropped back. A shallow breath slid between her teeth. I bent closer, letting my words graze the curve of her neck.
“Careful, Spells. You’re blushing, and the ghost is watching.”
She startled, straightened, then ducked under my arm to crouch beside a wooden trunk, suddenly fascinated by a rusted lamp.
I let her retreat and pulled the box from the top of the stack, forcing my hands to stay busy. For a few minutes, the only sounds were the whisper of paper and the occasional creak of the floorboards. Valerie sorted through the trunk’s contents while I dusted off another ledger—its spine stamped1975.
Finally.The leather cracked as I opened it, each page a graveyard of names and faded ink. Room numbers. Dates. Signatures.
My finger trailed down the list for December, findingNatalie Gray—Room 11, checked in fromDecember 1st through the 26th. Beneath her name, written smaller in the margin, was another:Daniel Keene, marked as a guest for two nights at the start of her stay.
A faint draft stirred the page, catching it in a phantom wind as if urging me to look beyond it. When I peered back into thebox, I found a small stack of photographs—faded color prints, their edges curled and yellowed with time. Guests in velvet and wool posed in the banquet hall before an immense stone fireplace. The ten-foot tree glittered nearby, mistletoe hanging above the mantel's gilt mirror.
One photograph stopped me cold.
I recognized Natalie Gray from the article Valerie had printed at the library. She stood beneath the mirror, a man's arm looped around her waist, his face unmistakably the ghost’s. Across the back, in scrawled ink, it read:December 3rd, 1975.
I looked up.
The ghost met my gaze and gave the smallest nod.
Mr. Snow had a name.
The photo reminded me of the one Valerie and I had taken at the luau, our heads bent close together, looking like a couple instead of two people pretending to be civil. It was a shame that was the only photo of us. Something that had started as a game had somehow ended up feeling real.
Real, like the couple in this photo.
A faint shimmer caught my eye. I looked down as the signet ring on my finger—Delaney crest and all—flared with a muted glow. The ghost’s gaze dropped to it, then back to me, his expression steady but weighted, as if he’d just handed me the answer without saying a word.
A ring. Maybe that’s why he was still here.
Before I could call Valerie over, she thumped the trunk lid shut, a puzzled look on her face. A cream-colored envelope dangled from her fingers.
